pear, blue cheese and walnut salad with a maple syrup vinaigrette

This post has become my most well read post on Drizzle and Dip, and I simply could not leave it out of my cookbook which was published last year. This image is the image from the book.

Here is the post as it was originally published:

pear, blue cheese and walnut salad with a maple syrup vinaigrette

I would like to take this opportunity to honour the person that invented this salad, whoever you may be, because it is just perfect in its simplicity. I tried to google the origin of it, but was swamped with hundreds of recipes.

I had the pears, the walnuts and a lump of beautiful blue cheese and wanted to make something a bit different based on the fact that this is not new, and has been somewhat overdone, but it really is difficult to alter a dish that is already a symphony of flavour with lovely textural, crunchy bits.

But I was in the mood for the ‘classic’ salad. So being in a ‘maple syrup’ frame of mind recently, and having thrown it over my oats with apple and pear the other day, I made up a vinaigrette dressing with it to give the salad the sweetness I felt it needed.

Make the salad up using any nice lettuce leaves that you prefer. I think rocket (arugula) works wonderfully here as this adds a nice peppery dimension to the sweet and salty. Slices of fresh pear, chunks of blue cheese and a sprinkling of raw walnuts and there you have it.

Try the blue cheese and pear salad with caramelized pecan nuts and home made croutons, I have made it several times now and my guests thought it was a world class salad! Just melt brown sugar on low heat until it is starting to melt, then add the pecan nuts and stir for a few minutes ( take it of the heat if necessary) . Croutons: cut a french baguette, put olive oil on it and rub the garlic in, place it in the oven (180 degr.) and bake it until golden brown, crunch it into smaller pieces and drizzle over the salad.

I just made this for lunch – it was sensational and the MOTH is raving about it. I used Pecans from the Tweed Valley just down the road, our own lettuce and new season pears from Stanthorpe! The cheese was a Shropshire Blue – rich, yellow and creamy. The dressing was wonderful! Thank you!